Lakewood Mayor Bob Murphy, left, city manager Kathy Hodgson and former mayor Steve Burkholder were among the dignitaries attending Hard Hat & High Heels. (Steve Peterson, Special to The Denver Post)

Exdo Event Center has a cool, unfinished urban warehouse feel to it; the perfect backdrop for Hard Hat & High Heels, a dinner-dance that set the stage for St. Anthony Central Hospital‘s upcoming move to a $435 million, state-of-the-art campus in Lakewood.

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Even the waiters got into the spirit of the occasion, wearing hard hat and construction bibs as they served a dinner of beef medallions and miso-glazed sea bass to guests seated at tables decorated with Tonka Trucks. Party favors were solid chocolate molded in the shape of hard hats and high-heeled shoes.

Put on by the St. Anthony Hospital Foundation, the event served both as a tribute to the hospital’s rich history and the promise of an exciting future. For the past 119 years, St. Anthony Central has been a landmark in Denver’s Sloan’s Lake neighborhood. It was founded by Sister Mary Huberta and a group of Sisters of St. Francis, who came to Denver from Indiana over a century ago, and is now part of the Centura Health network.

“This is a special evening, the culmination of seven years of hard work,” observed Dr. Raymond Mencini, the hospital’s interim president and CEO. “It’s been a long, long journey” but one that will enable the hospital to grow and expand its quality of care in such specialties as heart attack and stroke recovery, trauma and neuroscience.

Hard Hat & High Heels sold out weeks before it happened, attracting a crowd that included such dignitaries as Lakewood Mayor Bob Murphy; his predecessor, Steve Burkholder, and city manager Kathy Hodgson. Other special guests were Centura Health president Gary Campbell; Patricia Ladewig, president of the hospital board of directors; Leslie Strate, president of the St. Anthony Hospital Foundation; and Cathy Froning and Jeff Hesalroad, who were featured in a video that described the quality of care offered at St. Anthony Central. Froning, who worked at the hospital, was treated for Stage IV lung cancer while Hesalroad, an officer with the Golden Police Department, is a stroke survivor.

Sister Nancy Hoffman, who spent 40 years in pastoral care at the hospital before retiring in 2007, conducted the evening’s special appeal; 9News anchor Kim Christiansen was the emcee.

Other guests were Ramonna Robinson and Barb Jones from Ground Floor Media; Emily Stein, business development director for Action Coach Business Coaching; Michael Coughlin, owner of Lakewood’s popular 240 Union restaurant; and Kevin and Kathy Fone and Mark and Renee Haynes. The men are with GE Johnson Construction, the evening’s Platinum Sponsor.

Looks ranging from geisha to punk were featured in the show benefiting The Center. (Photo by Joanne Davidson, The Denver Post)

Big, curly, straight, pouffed up, slicked down. Stylists from 10 salons gave the audience locks to love for the annual 303 Magazine hair show at EXDO Event Center. This amazing display of creativity was a benefit for The Center and its programs serving Colorado’s gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender communities.

From the geisha-inspired hair, makeup and costumes from Berenicies to the knives, nails, files and spikes that gave an industrial-esque edge to the ‘do’s from The Parlour, the 25-minute show was both entertaining and enlightening, showing a packed house what Denver stylists can do when they’re encouraged to let their creativity soar.

There were, of course, some noteable exceptions. But it wasn’t that long ago that if you didn’t like fast food or chain restaurants you were pretty much out of luck when it came to dining out in Denver.
That has all changed in the past several years; today you have to look harder for a bad restaurant than a good one.
Which is why events like A Taste for Life are such fun. Organizers line up a couple dozen of the best and ask the chefs to serve a signature appetizer, entree or dessert for those eager to sample without having to commit to an entire meal in a single location.
Held at the Exdo Event Center, A Taste for Life was a $95-a-ticket benefit for Project Angel Heart. Presenting Sponsors were the M.A.C AIDS Fund and the event center; Christopher K.M. Leach was the chairman.
Working with David Alexander, Jeff Giadone, Dave McKlveen and Lee Rudofsky, Leach was able to offer food from Alto, Avenue Grill, Black Pearl, Cafe Star, Culinary School of the Rockies, Deluxe, Gelato d’Italia, Hapa Sushi, House of Commons, JAX Fish House, Kiva, La Sandia, Lifestyles Catering, Montecito and Tambien.
Even Project Angel Heart chefs offered tastes of the nourishing food the agency’s volunteers deliver to individuals in the Denver area with life-threatening illnesses.
The benefit began with cocktails and a reverse auction (beverages included Cooranbong Australian Vodka and wines from Budini Winery), followed by remarks from Project Angel Heart leaders.
Guests were then free to walk about the event center to gather up the food they could enjoy at tables hosted by such Project Angel Heart backers as Dan Brogan, Dr. Mark Tamer, Rosalie Goldman, Mark and Lori Cornetta, Ed Bronfin, Pat and Wills Long, Lori Rabinowitz and Ellis McFadden.

Pictures taken at A Taste for Life are posted at denverpost.com/SeenGallery.

Denver Post Society Editor Joanne Davidson can be reached at 303-809-1314 or jdavidson@denverpost.com.

Study after study has shown that when it comes to charitable fundraisers, Denver has more per capita than any comparably sized city in the nation. Joanne Davidson has been covering them for The Denver Post since 1985, coming here from her native California where she'd spent the previous seven years as San Francisco bureau chief for U.S. News & World Report magazine.